Tuesday, November 8, 2016

I'm in Paris for Paris Photo from Wednesday November 9 until November 17... and London a week after that. If any photo friends feel like a coffee or a beer, whatever... please get in touch: harvey.benge@xtra.co.nz

Monday, November 7, 2016

This short YouTube video is worth checking out. Although it deals with cinematography, I think you'll agree that the ideas apply to still photography as well. Basically different shapes within the frame convey different meaning.

Saturday, November 5, 2016

Back in October I was pleased to get a preview of the the show - Japanese Photography from Postwar to Now. Curated by Sandra Phillips the show opened October 15 and runs until March 12, 2017.

SF MoMA say this: One of the most significant contributions to the art of photography
comes from postwar Japan. After World War II, the country began to
produce film and camera equipment, supporting a large amateur
photography culture and sponsoring native photographers as important
artistic producers. This exhibition highlights SFMOMA’s considerable
collection of Japanese photography, focusing on generous gifts from our
community and the important donation of the Kurenboh Collection, Tokyo. Japanese Photography from Postwar to Now
includes photographs from the 1960s, when major figures such as Shomei
Tomatsu and Daido Moriyama investigated Americanization and industrial
growth; the more personal and performative work of Nobuyoshi Araki and
Eikoh Hosoe; and photography addressing the present culture and the
Fukushima nuclear disaster. Organized thematically, the show explores
topics such as Japan’s relationship with America, changes in the city
and countryside, and the emergence of women, especially Miyako Ishiuchi,
Rinko Kawauchi, and Lieko Shiga, as significant contributors to
contemporary Japanese photography.

This is an immersive show which touches all the bases and is the best overview of Japanese photography I've seen.

If you are in Paris next week for Paris Photo do not miss going along to Polycopies on the boat Concorde-Atlantique moored on the Siene a few minutes walk from the Grand Palais.
Founded in 2014 by the photo luminaries Laurent Chardon and Sebastian Hau, as always Polycopies is a total dedication to the photo book. I describe then event as authentic, it is that because at Polycopies there is a chance to meet the photographers (this year Pieter Hugo, Takashi Homma, JH Engström and Roger Ballen among many others) and publishers all of different stripes. All brought together in an intimate setting.

Tuesday, November 1, 2016

Sunday, October 30, 2016

In his new book 2. 1. 3. to how see, Looking, Talking and Thinking about Art, painter David Salle cuts to the chase in this assembly of his critical essays. Salle has the knack of avoiding bullshit and theoretical cul de sac's. His writing gets directly to the guts of what it's about to make art that works. Great art even.

I particularly liked what he had to say in an essay about artist Dana Schutz: Remember talent? A person who is said to have talent can do something: often it's physical, like throwing a football or playing the cello. Then there is imagination; the difference between it and talent is often misunderstood. Imagination fuels talent and funnels into it, but on its own lacks body. Today talent is easily confused with knowingness or a desire for attention, and what passes for imagination is often nothing more than a reshuffling of cultural signs. That's fashion. Occasionally an artist comes along with both talent and real imagination as well as the ability to combine them - to cast an original idea into pictorial form... as with all effective art, the greatness is partly a matter of the imagination behind it and partly a matter of style.

For more on David Salle you can go to his website HERE. And if you're interested you can go to amazon HERE to get a copy of 2.1.3.

Friday, October 28, 2016

As some of you may already know, I have just self-published (what many consider my most iconic work) Raised By Wolves, as a xerox-style Bootleg version.The original book is largely unavailable except at very high prices - and with this new edition, an entirely new generation will have access. It’s also a way to re-stock all those school libraries that have had RBW stolen off their shelves.

I am having a book signing on November 12th at Uptown in San Francisco from 3-5pm, where I'll be signing each book in a unique way. I hope to see you all there. If you know of anyone who can't make it or is interested in purchasing Raised By Wolves (Bootleg)...

Here's the link: jimgoldberg.com
If you’ve already purchased the book, many thanks.

Jim

Often considered Goldberg’s seminal project, Raised by Wolves combines ten years of original photographs,
text, and other illustrative elements (home movie stills, snapshots,
drawings, diary entries, and images of discarded belongings) to document
the lives of runaway teenagers in San Francisco and Los Angeles. The book quickly became a classic in the photobook canon and, thus, the original is essentially unavailable.

In the spirit of Tweeky Dave, Goldberg is releasing a xerox style bootleg version of the book with numerous
surprises inserted by the artist. At 9x12 inches, the same size as the
original, the re-issue features 320 color and black and white pages,
perfect bound, with a color softcover. Raised By Wolves Bootleg re-issue - $100 plus shipping*

David Zwirner
New York presents its first exhibition with William Eggleston since having
announced the gallery’s exclusive worldwide representation of the
artist. On view at 537 West 20th Street in New York will be works from
Eggleston’s monumental project The Democratic Forest.

Over the course of nearly six decades, Eggleston has established a
singular pictorial style that deftly combines vernacular subject matter
with an innate and sophisticated understanding of color, form, and
composition. His photographs transform the ordinary into distinctive,
poetic images that eschew fixed meaning. His 1976 solo exhibition at The
Museum of Modern Art, New York, curated by John Szarkowski, marked the
first presentation of color photography at the museum. Although
initially criticized for its unfamiliar approach, the show and its
accompanying catalogue, William Eggleston’s Guide, heralded an important
moment in the medium’s acceptance within the art historical canon, and
it solidified the artist’s position as one of its foremost practitioners
to this date. Eggleston’s work continues to exert an influence on
contemporary visual culture at large.

The Democratic Forest is among Eggleston’s most ambitious projects
and a prime example of his uniquely recognizable aesthetic. Likened to
an epic journey or an enduring narrative, it comprises a careful
selection of works from over ten thousand negatives he took in the
mid-1980s across the southern and eastern parts of America and in
several European countries. These photographs of rural back roads,
industrial and residential environs, architectural details, restaurant
interiors, and parking lots, among other locales, eluded the conventions
of both reportage and the black-and-white art photography practiced by
many of the artist’s peers at the time, and instead shaped their own
definition of what a photographic image could be—intuitive and charged
with imaginative possibilities. Collectively, the project echoes
Eggleston’s predilection for the “democratic” vision of the camera, able
to render equally what is in front of the lens.

The exhibition runs October 27 - December 17, 2016. There is a catalogue published by David Zwirner Books/Steidl on the occasion of the show.

About Me

My pictures explore the strange anthropology of cities. The unusual and overlooked in the human landscape.
I am asking the viewer to question the idea that photographs as documents are complete representations of subject.
I'm interested in the universality of life and the idea of parallel lives - when one thing is happening here, something else is happening over there. The democracy of non-places fascinates me, in the knowledge that inevitably nothing is as it seems.
I work and live between Auckland and Paris.
http://harveybenge.com/
email:harvey.benge@xtra.co.nz